It should be recalled that, by law, every slaughtered animal must be subjected to sanitary inspection. The veterinary surgeon having carried out such examination applies on the animals, based on health rules, an official stamp on different parts of each animal which are explicitly designated by legislation. In the domain of sanitary inspection of slaughtered hogs, the present law provides placing on every half-carcass of a hog, five sanitary stamps, viz. on the cheek, shoulder, ribs, loin and ham.
It is known in the prior art to apply sanitary stamps via a manually manoeuvred pad. It is clear that it is a delicate, unpleasant and fastidious operation to place sanitary stamps on slaughtered animals. Moreover, the execution of this operation presents a duration which becomes more and more incompatible with the speed of the industrial slaughtering chains. Furthermore, the duration of this operation tends to increase, insofar as the legislation aims at increasing the number of sanitary stamps having to be placed on the slaughtered animals.
There is therefore a need to have means available for rendering automatic the operation of application of the official stamps on the slaughtered animals, whilst conserving the vet's autorization for each animal.
In an attempt to satisfy this need, various technical solutions have been proposed. For example, Patent Application FR-A-2 523 813 describes a marking apparatus adapted to place stamps on carcasses of slaughtered animals suspended from a conveyor. The apparatus comprises a guide ramp extending parallel to the direction of advance of the carcasses to allow the latter to abut on the ramp, during the marking operation. A presence detector is mounted on the guide ramp so as to allow control of pivoting of two arms, each equipped with a marking pad.
Such an apparatus does not give satisfaction in practice. In fact, the animal is not held efficiently during marking, which is detrimental to the efficiency of the marking operation. Furthermore, the rubbing of the animal on the guide ramp leads to a jerky advance of the animal, affecting the correct placing of the pads. Moreover, such an apparatus is not adapted to ensure application of a series of stamps on each half-carcass of the animal.
Patent Application EP 0 273 371 also proposes an installation providing various examinations and treatments on the slaughtered animals and, in particular, allowing the application of pads. This installation comprises a series of mobile carriages moving on a closed circuit and intended to carry the slaughtered animals during their passage in front of different examination stations and, in particular, a branding station. The branding station is composed of a series of articulated arms mounted on a fixed column and each provided with a pad. Pivoting of the arms is controlled when the carriage supporting the animal passes in front of the branding station.
The installation described by this document is manifestly very complex to operate and its manufacturing costs are prohibitive. Moreover, it proves particularly delicate to obtain an efficient branding, due to the very principle of this installation which consists in applying stationary pads on an advancing slaughtered animal.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to overcome the drawbacks of the prior art techniques, by proposing a machine designed to ensure correct application of the pads on various parts of the skin of a slaughtered animal and to be integrated in an industrial slaughtering chain without making any modification thereto.
Another object of the invention aims at proposing a machine allowing application of the pads on the various parts of the animal imposed by law, whatever the size of the animal.
Another object is to propose a machine capable of adapting itself to the configuration of hooking of the slaughtered animal suspended from the conveyor.